A brand new night
by Lady Devonna
Summary: Hah... lousy title. Sort-of-sequal to that night. Yuki gets an unexpected letter...


A/N: This is a sort-of-sequel to "That Night," though it's written in quite a different vein. It doesn't depend on the events of that story, but they'll be referenced rather often, and I'll be using an original character I invented for it. You could go read that one—and I suggest you do because reviews add validity to my hollow existence—and then look back here, or read the brief summery I'll give in the next paragraph. Whatever powders your proverbial doughnut.

What happened: Yuki and Shuichi were driving in the rain, at night, and when a car stalled out in front of them Yuki swerved to avoid it. He broke his arm in the accident, and Shuichi was thrown into a coma, apparently never to emerge. Several chapters of potent Yuki-angst ensued. In the midst of it, Yuki's cousin Yori appeared, a philosophic radiologist who showed up once to be angsted at and again to save the day. In the end, Shuichi woke up, and Yuki Eiri retired, so to speak, when he decided to publish as Uesagi Eiri instead, writing literature instead of fluff (a lesson certain authors-me included- could take). Oh, and Ryuichi was vaguely involved in a few places, and at one point presented Yuki with a YELLOW bunny named Kichi, and Yuki bought a cat named Shika.

"Yuuuuuuuuukiiiiiiiiiiiii Iiiiiiiiiiiii'mmmmmmmmmmm Hoooooooooooommmmmmmmme!"

"Shuuuuiiichiii I don't caaare..." Yuki smiled to himself as a practiced whine emitted from the living room. Since the accident, he'd realized just how much his Shu-chan meant to him, but he still hadn't quite gotten over the habit of... well, being a jerk.

Knowing Shuichi would be scrambling in with a smile and morality lecture within a few seconds, Yuki snuffed his cigarette and slid his beer can behind the printer. His life really should have done a complete turnaround following the unexpected restoration of his precious Shuichi, but his vices didn't look like vanishing any time soon.

"Yuki, Yori's coming over..." Shuichi left a tentative peck on Yuki's cheek to go with the news, testing the waters. His beloved had been acting a little weird since the... incident. Unable to deny that it was sort of Yuki's fault that he'd almost died, Shuichi was just trying not think about it.

Yuki twisted around and pulled Shuichi onto his lap, resting his chin on that most delicate of shoulders. "When's she coming, and what're the chances of getting rid of her?"

"She said f- Yuki, stop that!"

"Stop what?"

Before Yuki even started on Shuichi's belt, the door was flung open with a throaty "La li ho! Sorry I stole your opener, Shu-chan. But it was waaaay too good to pass up."

"Hi, Yori-chan!"

Grunt.

"Well, glad to see my cousin's as happy to see me as all that." She patted Yuki's head and settled into the green bowl chair Hiro had garbage picked for them at their two-year anniversary. "I've obviously interrupted you, so I'll be off. Besides, I've got a blind date at the hole in the wall coffee house in five. Tatsuha gave me this to give to you."

Yori dropped an envelope on the desk, next to Yuki's 8x10 of Shuichi.

Yuki eyed her dubiously. "You two been watching spy movies again?"

"For a writer, you have horrid grammar. No, I haven't had the patience to watch movies with him since he hit puberty. I ran into him outside Victoria's Secret."

"I can guess what he was doing there. What's your excuse?" Yuki grunted as Shuichi jumped off his lap and wandered into the kitchen in search of pocky.

"Getting a present for an old girlfriend. She went straight on me. Anyway, he said some girl you two both bonked didn't have your address, and sent him something to give you. Being a lazy asshole and apparently never having heard of the federal mail service, he passed it off to me." She stood, waved, stole a paperclip (for which she probably had no use), and wandered out.

Yuki rolled his eyes and ignored the letter, reaching for a cigarette. Shuichi scurried back in. "Yuuuuuukiiiiiiii... You're not gonna answer some lady, are you? You're _my_ husband!"

To be annoying (he had no intention of responding to some horny broad's summons... at the moment), he opened the letter and read in what he imagined was a deep, throaty, sensuous woman's voice. "Dear Yuki-san, remember me? Kumachiro Ruri. If you forgot—" Yuki dropped what came out as a bad Greta Garbo imitation and stared blankly, reading like a tired yet shocked android. "I'll castrate you with a rusty spoon if you did, bastard! You're going to meet me at seven at the lousy café you first asked me out. You're also going to come alone. Got it?"

"Yuuuuuuuukiiiiiiiiiii?"

Yuki jumped. He realized he'd been staring at the letter for a while. "Uh... She was the brunette... With the black belt... And the unbelievable legs... Who liked Tatsuha more than me."

"YUKI!"

"Quiet, baka, I'm thinking." He was, and not only about Ruri's legs. They hadn't parted on friendly terms, and bitching at him couldn't be so important as all that. His curiosity was piqued.

"Okay, nuisance." Yuki glared down at Shuichi over his glasses, looking severe. It was fun. "You call one of your idiotic friends and go in before me. I'll need backup."

"You're GOING?"

"Stop squeaking. I need those ears." He stood and stretched. "I'm seeing what she's up to. We're talking one insidious bitch."

"Woooo-hoooo! Stealth mission!" Shuichi ran off humming spy music.

Yuki slunk into Coffee House, somewhat heartened when he spotted Shiuichi, Hiro, and Kumagoro at a corner table, badly pretending to be deep in conversation.

Ruri was at another table in the dingiest of dingy corners. She hadn't changed at all in... almost five years. Yuki winced at the time that'd passed—it made him feel old—and approached the table.

Her scented cigarette smoke engulfed him, so thick it almost hid her cold, if perfect face and disheveled mane of dark brown hair. She was a manipulative bitch of the worst kind, and had come into his life at the height of his own cold bitch period. He hadn't thought of her in years. So what about this meeting was causing the cold shiver down his back?

Well, no need for her to know he'd undergone a spiritual, if not social, transformation. "What?"

"Oh, nothing. I'm talking to you because I fuckin' want to." She blew a smoke ring in his face. "Bring to mind, if the thing works, that last night before I ditched you for the non-freak."

"I could argue with a description of Tatsuha as a non-freak... Though he's not a slight genetic mutation." Yuki stared at the ceiling a minute. "Okay... It's coming... You're coming. I'm not..."

She kicked him under the table. "Shut the fuck up. You're the one that bought the condom."

"...Huh?" She'd lost him entirely.

Ruri scowled. It was her natural expression, but she managed it anyhow. "Yukiko, come here, hun."

"Don't call me that." Yuki turned towards the tiny voice. He'd half noticed the little girl sitting alone as he came in, but it hadn't registered. Kids annoyed him.

She obeyed reluctantly. As she got closer (coughing in the cigarette smog), Yuki noticed she was, in general, a small, young Ruri.

That was until she stopped and looked up a foot from the table. Her eyes, mostly obscured by the hair escaping her ribbon, were golden.

Do they have those in Japan? They do now. Or perhaps, in the fine tradition of Wudbeiser and Zennys, it should be Virginia's Secret, or Victoria's Riddle...

The real name of a coffee place near me


End file.
